Radley's Home for Horny Monsters, Annabelle Hawthorne [howl and other poems TXT] 📗

there, but Cecilia was sitting on the swing, gazing out into the yard. Mike walked onto the porch, keeping Dana from looking at the banshee. “So tell me more about your major.”

“Not a lot to tell. Class during the day, labs on weekend mornings. I have this gig to help make ends meet with student loans and such. I’m the only girl in my program now, so I deal with a lot of creeps.” She said the last bit with a great deal of emotion, but Mike decided not to ask about it.

Mike stayed just ahead of her, walking down the path to her car, hoping she wouldn’t look back. Cecilia seemed quite content on her swing, her hair fanning out around her as if she was storing up a massive charge.

“Hey, if you need an extra hand fixing stuff around here, I would love to help out. My dad worked construction when I was growing up, so I’m pretty handy.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” They were at her car now, with the glowing Pizza Palace marquee on its roof. She seemed reluctant to leave, but got in, buckled up, then gave him a wave, the light from her GPS casting an eerie light on her face as she drove away.

Mike let out a huge sigh, then ran back up the steps to the house. Cecilia wasn’t sitting anymore-instead she was staring inside the living room window. “Something is happening,” she informed him.

“What?” Mike asked. Cecilia shrugged. You’re the Check Engine Light of the Damned, Mike thought to himself. He walked inside, staring upstairs and then toward the kitchen. Choosing the kitchen, he found Tink sitting at the table, clicking through websites on his laptop while eating her ill-gotten pizza.

“We need to have a quick chat about... what the hell are you eating?” He was standing behind her, and Tink tilted her head up and back.

“Tink order best pizza,” she informed him, holding up a slice for his inspection. Pepperoni, sausage, and pineapple adorned the top. The soda she had picked was orange, most of which was gone already. Only two slices of pizza were left in the box.

“You really are a little monster, aren’t you?” Mike flicked a piece of pineapple off.

“Tink find good stuff on magic screen.”

Looking over the top of her head, he saw that she was on Amazon and currently had nearly a hundred items in his cart. He leaned past her and opened it up to see what she was buying. “Tink!” he shouted, seeing that his total was in the thousands. “What do you think you are doing?”

“Tink see good stuff for fix house.” She opened her mouth wide and dropped an entire piece of pizza in. She licked the grease off her fingers. “Tink has job to do.”

“Okay, I see we’re going to have to talk about this right now.” Mike closed the laptop, eliciting protest from Tink. “The magic screen is off limits for the time being. Now I want you to-“

A loud thud caused the light hanging above the table to sway from side to side. Tink slid her goggles on, and they both stared at the ceiling.

“What was that?” Mike asked.

“Tink not sure.” She touched the side of her goggles, rotating a dial Mike had never noticed. “Water in ceiling.”

“Oh fuck.” Mike remembered the splashing noise from before. Running toward the stairs, he slid to a stop when he saw that the grandfather clock was no longer there. “Fuck!” Sprinting up the stairs, his feet squished on wet carpet when he neared the bedroom door. Shoving it open, he heard running water splashing  against the bathroom floor. He moved toward the sound, stepping into the bathroom. “Naia?”

“It’s about fucking time!” Naia appeared, splashing water everywhere. “I’ve been shouting for you to get up here.”

“I didn’t hear you. The door was closed.” Tink slammed into Mike from behind, nearly knocking him over. “What’s wrong?”

“There’s a fire elemental loose, nasty little shit was sniffing around up here. I was trying to snuff him out, but he got away.”

“What does it look like?” Mike asked. Walking into his room, he saw tiny scorch marks all along the wall. Inspecting them from up close, he saw that they were footprints.

“Like a lizard,” Naia said from behind him. “Mike, it isn’t something from the house. It got in somehow, and it was laying low.”

“For what reason?” he asked, peering under the bed.

“To kill goblin husband,” Tink hissed, looking all around the room. She hit a hidden button on her goggles and several mechanical arms sprouted, each one with a different covered lens. Flicking them into place, she knelt by the door of the room.

“Wait, to kill me?”

“Possibly. This one was sniffing around like it was trying to find a place to hide. If it wanted to, it could just burn the whole house down, but they are great for assassinations.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Mike said, checking the window, but it was locked from the inside. He heard stomping above the room, followed by the sight of gray claws on the rain gutter. He opened the window up. “Abella, have you seen anything leave the house?”

“No. I don’t know how it got in, either.” Abella leaned over the edge of the house. “If you chase it outside, I can take care of it.”

“But where did it come from? Did it come in with the pizza girl?”

“It was here long before that,” Naia said. “It must have come in with you earlier today.”

“But that doesn’t...” He thought back to the spark he felt when he had taken the paperwork from Elizabeth. “Tink, check the trash downstairs.”

“Tink go look.” The goblin grabbed a towel and dunked it in the bath. She wrung it out, then rolled it up and cracked it like a whip. “Mike stay here.”

“Like hell I will.” Mike dunked his own towel. “I’m coming with you.”

“You both need to be careful,” Naia said. “If it touches you, it may just immolate you to nothing but